text: In 1749, Wood returned to Cumberland to build and manage a forge at Egremont. His partners were Peter How, William Hicks, and Gabriel Griffiths, a Whitehaven brazier.  Wood and How leased coal mines in Egremont, while How, Griffiths, William Brownrigg and Joseph Bowes (a merchant) leased iron ore mines.  He recorded experiments in iron making in a memorandum book.  Initially he sued iron ore according to his father's process, but later moved on to reworking scrap iron and later still "coldshort metal", probably pig iron.
  In September 1754, Wood and toured the Midlands with Gabriel Griffiths, visiting ironworks in the area.  They visited fireclay works at Stourbridge and his brother John Wood, who had a forge at Wednesbury.  John was working scraps and using pots to do so.
  In 1763, Charles and John Wood patented their ironmaking process, which is usually described by historians as potting and stamping.  This followed one to John Wood alone in 1761.
  In December 1763, Peter Hows tobacco firm became bankrupt, as did the braziers business of Gabriel Griffiths and Robert Ross.  The fate of the forge is not clear.  In 1789, the building had been suffered to decay, and the expense of repairing it was more than the lease was worth, so that the lease was surrendered.  However, Wood had left there in 1766 to go to Merthyr Tydfil.